


When Devils Tell the Truth

by Jennifer-Oksana (JenniferOksana)



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Angst, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-09
Updated: 2016-01-09
Packaged: 2018-05-12 17:25:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,993
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5674396
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JenniferOksana/pseuds/Jennifer-Oksana
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Was ever woman in this humor wooed? Was ever woman in this humor won?</p>
            </blockquote>





	When Devils Tell the Truth

I am watching her from the door and wondering why.

Beauty. She is, without a doubt, an image worthy of a museum, one of  
those famous guys like Da Vinci or Raphael, you know, a famous artist. I  
don’t know their names. Mulder might, but Mulder’s that sort of guy.  
Cultured. Bred pretty, like horses. I know a little something about the  
horses; you might call it a perk of the job.

I wouldn’t, but you might.

Been a while since I last saw the lovely lady, and she wasn’t fucked up  
quite like this. Neither was I, to tell the truth. Last time I saw her,  
I had two arms and she wasn’t dancing around, piss drunk and trying to  
hit on some big-eyed undergrad with that utterly seductive urchin air and  
blue streaks in his hair.

The music’s fucking blaring in here and it reeks of cigarettes and booze  
and crime. Shady Lady’s my favorite DC bar, and my first stop after my  
arrival back in the good ol’ US of A. I stop waiting at the door because  
I don’t particularly feel like getting stomped and boot-slapped by the  
next brooding shit who wants in, and I cruise to the bar. I’m pleased to  
see my favorite bartender, Leif, pouring the domestic brews to the yokels  
and better shit to those of us who pay him better.

Leif is a badass. He’s like five four, got a face like a bulldog, kinda  
slender, but I’ve seen the man throw men literally twice his size halfway  
across the bar. See, Leif was a gymnast, a boxer, and a wrestler in his  
younger days, and he also sampled well of the fine steroids they’d  
provide him. He takes no shit off no one, and no one would try unless  
they were asking for it.

“Hey, Alexei, boychik,” Leif calls as I settle down on a stool. “Where  
the fuck you been, man?”

“Russia, man. They chopped my arm off.”

“You’re dickin’ me,” Leif said, admiring my prosthesis. “Sucks to be  
you, pretty boy. You have to quit your biz? Maybe get a job as the best  
lookin’ one-armed man on earth? Maybe get a job as pretty lady’s gigolo–  
like her, f’rinstance?”

He points over at *her*, all red hair and blue eyes and too-nice clothes.  
Her target is in fifteen-year-old Levi’s, a shirt he probably stole from  
work, and fake leather boots. The kid is the real deal. Her Scullyness  
is faking it, for what reason I don’t fucking know.

“What’s her story?”

“No clue, man. She don’t talk, except to ask for another whiskey  
straight. My guess is that her dickhead dentist husband is getting blown  
by a bimbo secretary and she’s getting her revenge. Kinda sad, I think.  
There are probably kids, you know, a nice house, minivan, that sort  
of thing.”

I hold back my laughter. Mulder is indeed a dickhead, but the rest of  
it– ha. Appearances lie like weasel assassins on the witness stand.  
Leif looks at me, sees me watching her.

“You know her, Alexei?”

“Yeah. Trust me, if she was getting done dirt, the bastard would be  
facing the business end of her gun. Don’t mess with her, Leif. She looks  
like she’s Maryland’s finest soccer mom, but she is, in fact, one rock-  
hard bitch with titanium balls.”

“And you’d bang her in the bathroom if she gave you a come-hither look,  
you no-good slimeball,” Leif replied. “She’s gonna get hurt, she keep  
coming in here and getting blasted.”

“Aww, Leif, you feel for her?”

“Shut up, you prick,” Leif growls as the lady herself strolls up to the  
bar. Panic. It’s all well and good to bluster, but I know she carries a  
gun, I know she wouldn’t hesitate to use it, and I know I’m on her list  
of “Shoot first, grind bones to make bread later.”

“What can I get you?” he asks her. She’s seen me. She has to recognize  
me, even though I’ve turned away. I flick glances her way, to make sure  
that the redhead beside me, reeking of good perfume, cigarettes, and  
stiff whiskey is indeed Dana Scully.

God in his heaven. This is Dana Scully? This waif-woman, this crystalline  
beauty? I didn’t look too close last we met. In fact, the last time I  
clearly remember looking at her was in Virginia, while Duane Barry  
piped Mulder down the path to Hamlin or whatever. Raving psychopathic  
loony, both of ’em. Scully then was dowdy, dumpy, and chubby.

Scully now is brittle, bright, and beautiful. Her jeans may be brand new  
wannabe white trash, but they hug just right, showing off the curve of  
calf, thigh, ass, hip, hanging carelessly there. Her shirt shows off  
pale waist, curved in just perfectly as her breasts curve out, round and  
full and damned sexy in that clinging t-shirt thing she’s wearing.

What a choice piece of ass.

But it’s the eyes that have me caught like a moth. Those big blue eyes.  
Something’s wrong with them. Besides the fact she’s fucked out of her  
mind on probably more than booze– that’s pretty easy to decipher from  
experience– it’s something. She looks trapped, furious, a little crazy  
behind the eyes.

I’ve seen desperation like that before. My mind immediately goes to  
Mulder, the devil in him, strangling Duane Barry (crazy fuck, I didn’t  
feel much guilt when I finally gave him a little mercy), for her. Yet  
from what I’ve heard, Mulder made it home alive from Russia. What’s  
driving her?

“Take a picture,” I hear suddenly, a slow and lazy drawl. “It’ll last  
longer.”

Shit. I have been caught. Alexei Krycek is going to meet his Maker,  
care of an angel. I turn to face her.

“This clown buggin’ you?” Leif asks her.

“No,” she replies. “Just lookin. Get me something, I don’t come over  
here to talk to your punk ass, Leif. So, you, what’s your name?”

Oh, God. She really is trashed if she doesn’t recognize one of her worst  
enemies. I want to say something to get her eyes off of me, but there’s  
something else.

I never cared that much about Scully. She was there, natch, Mulder’s  
girl, whatever. It wasn’t as if her existence really impacted mine. Of  
course, before, she was never two feet away, completely out of control,  
screaming for something. Sure, she was pretty, before, but there are a  
lot of pretty women, and most of ’em aren’t screaming for my blood.

“Alexei,” I say quickly, as if I had something in my throat. Son of a  
bitch, I do. My pulse is throbbing in my ears, in my head, in my groin.  
Son of a bitch.

“Sexy Alexei,” she says, laughing at herself. She plunks herself down  
next to me and sets her hand familiarly on my thigh. “Did I tell you my  
name?”

“No,” I gulp. What sort of wicked spell has this woman put on me? I feel  
like a sixteen-year-old. I’m sporting wood like a sixteen-year-old. Is  
this what it feels like to be Mulder? Damn.

“Good,” she said, cocking her head. “Don’t think I wanna share my name  
with a dirty hood like you. Think I look sexy?”

Her perfect white fingers inch up on my jeans. Take me now, Lord. She  
has recognized me. She’s going to yank my balls out and feed them to me.  
I know it. I’ll play along. Maybe Leif will save me.

“Hell yeah. You’re hot.”

Leif leans over. “Sorry to interrupt, but what do you want?”

“Cure for cancer,” she snarls. “What the fuck do you think?”

“Another whiskey. And you, Alexei?”

“Beer. Heineken.”

Leif stumbles away and I stare down at this woman who has me utterly in  
thrall. I don’t even like her, she’s not even my type, but if she said  
the word–

“Cure for cancer?” I ask.

She bites her lip. “Ever spent a night knowing you might not see dawn?”

“Every night,” I reply recklessly, reaching out with my one arm toward  
her. She shakes her head.

“I’m dying,” she says. “Kinda shook my priorities up. Kinda changed  
things.”

“And what happens next?” I ask, leaning closer. There’s no space  
between us.

“Years go by, and I’m stripped of my beauty,” she whispers. “But what if,  
you know? What if?”

“What if what?” I ask, thoroughly confused by her. All I want to do is  
throw her against a wall and screw her silly. She smiles and it’s very  
attractive on her.

“What if I’m a mermaid?” she asks, pulling her hand from my thigh, and  
grabbing my hand. Thank God it’s the real one.

“Then you’re a fish out of water,” I reply. She pulls me forward, on to  
the floor. She pulls my arm around her.

“Dance with me, Alexei,” she whispers. “I wanna dance.”

She can’t be serious. She can’t be this coherent and yet be so out of it  
she doesn’t recognize me. She wants my blood. I know this. But my body  
takes over, like I’ve trained myself. Use your instinct, but my  
instinct’s all shot to hell.

The music’s slow and slinky and she smiles at me. My heart starts beating  
out a staccato rhythm. Her arms slinks around my waist and what the hell,  
I start to dance with her.

“If your husband sees us,” I tease as she shifts her little body closer  
against mine. “Will he kill us?”

“I don’t have a husband,” she replies, snuggling up closer, thighs  
pressed against mine. “What makes you think I got a husband?”

“You look too nice for this place,” I sputter. Scully’s eyes flash.

“I am too nice. But I don’t care any more. In six months, I’ll be all  
nice and dead in a pretty box. You ever think what you’re gonna look  
like in your coffin, Sexy?”

I don’t want to tell her I don’t think I’ll end up in a coffin. A hastily  
dug ditch, maybe the bottom of a lake, that’ll be Alex Krycek’s final  
resting place.

“No,” I tell her honestly.

“I do, I do,” she tells me. Maybe she’s drunker than I thought. “I’ll  
be so pretty. Mom will lay me out in a white dress, I know my mom, and  
the mortician will put red on my lips and red on my cheeks and soft wine  
colors on my eyes. They’ll curl my hair and put me in a box, and everyone  
will cry and cry.”

“You’re fucked,” I tell her. “How many whiskeys have you had, Dana?”

“Not enough,” she replies. “I wanna get fucked. Any way I can. I wanna  
experience all those things you’re supposed to before you die.”

“I think you need to go home,” I tell her. My body is screaming and  
aching, but my instinct and my wits have come back. If anyone ever found  
out I dared touch her, it’s my fucking funeral. Mulder, Skinner, my  
ex-bosses, shit. I’d be blown into little scraps. Hell, they’d have to  
take a number, because when Scully came back from wherever she is, she’d  
find me and gut me.

“I’m not going alone. You’re coming with me,” she tells me, wrapping her  
arms around my neck. “I’m not ending up alone tonight.”

Oh God. I’m only human. You can’t just refuse an invitation like that.

“Are you sure?” I ask, surprising myself. We’re walking toward the exit,  
so I don’t know how much it counts. “Where are we going?”

“A place,” she tells me cryptically. “One of your arms is fake.”

“Yeah, some motherfuckers cut it off,” I tell her. “You smell good.  
Like perfume and liquor and leather.”

Her eyes glitter and we stumble out of the bar together. “We’re not  
going home, I’ve decided,” she tells me in a crisp voice that matches  
the crisp air.

“Where to, then?” I ask her as she hails a cab. My stomach’s crawling.

“Arlington,” she says. My eyes widen. I know where we’re going. I knew  
this was all too good to be true.

“Why? What? Where do you live, anyway?” I ask, panicked.

“Somewhere else.”

I picture Mulder and Scully cheerfully feeding my body to Mulder’s fish.  
I picture a lot of things. I picture Skinner being along for the ride,  
because he’s got it in for me, too, and both of those idiot motherfuckers  
would come back from the dead for Scully.

But who’s got the lady herself in his lap in the cab? Who’s got her  
lips moving across his face and lips? I’m being stupid.

“Is there anyone– oh, God, stop that, please– anyone at this place in  
Arlington?” I gasp.

“No. Not this weekend. Convention.”

I am going to do this. I’m trusting this dangerous creature. No wonder  
I’m one-armed. I’m dumb as shit. The cab pulls up at Mulder’s building  
and we lurch out together.

“Oh. God.”

“Alex,” she says, drawing my lips to hers. “How long is it going to be  
before you ask me why I haven’t killed you yet?”

She kisses me, sweeps her tongue into my mouth, takes my breath away  
and pushes us into the building before she lets me go enough to answer.

“You knew?”

“You thought I didn’t?” she asks. She won’t let go of me.

“You’re pretty bombed,” I admit, as her fingers sneak under the fabric  
of my jacket and shirt and linger there, hot as fire. “I didn’t know  
what you were doing.”

“I think you do,” she replies, tugging my shirt out of my pants. “Or  
has it been that long since I’ve tried to seduce someone that I’m  
absolutely useless at it?”

“Oh, good God, no,” I gasp. “If you weren’t as good as you are, do you  
really think I’d come up with you to Mulder’s apartment? Are you going  
to feed me to his fish?”

“Screw his fish. You’re my dinner.”

And off come my jacket and shirt. She’s sneaky. I notice we’re already  
breathing hard, and I grin down at her. This is surreal. I’m not sure  
that I’m not dead, and this isn’t some prelude to hell.

“So why Mulder’s?” I ask as we reach the elevator, my good hand clasped  
around one of her breasts and teasing.

“One of the things I wanted to do before I died,” she whispers. “You’re  
not my first choice, though.”

“What?”

“I always wanted to do it on his couch.”

It hits me like a ton of bricks. For some reason it pisses me off. She  
doesn’t want me. I could be Leif for all she cared. With her eyes  
closed, it’ll be Mulder making love to her. She does want revenge on him.

I push her up against the elevator wall. “You’ve gotta be kidding me,”  
I hiss at her. “You’re nuts.”

“Maybe the brain tumor’s driving me crazy,” she whispers back. She’s not  
afraid. “What’s wrong about it?”

“Gonna scream his name?”

Her eyes narrow. “I don’t scream.”

“You’re using me.”

“And it’s not going both ways?” she asks sharply, grinding against me.  
“Give a dying woman a break. I need a body. You need a body. The rest  
of it’s unimportant.”

She pushes me back, and yanks off her shirt. The doors open. Her hands  
scramble for her pockets and she yanks out her keys. I follow, but all  
the fun has gone out of it. Until she throws open the door and pulls me  
in.

“You can pretend it’s him, too,” she says. “I’ve seen how you look at  
him.”

She strips and I’m aroused again. I pull off my jeans, clumsy as ever,  
and I meet her halfway on the couch. And then–

And then what? Mulder rushes in to stop us? She changes her mind and  
blows my head off? No. It happens. Effortlessly. I kiss her, she kisses  
me, I cop a feel, so does she, back and forth and back and forth until,  
before I even realize it, I’m buried in her, we’re howling like a couple  
of loonies.

Then I look down and realize her eyes are closed and it’s not me making  
love to her until she screams. It’s someone’s else hand, someone else’s  
lips, someone else entirely.

She calls him when she comes, moaning and pleading and squirming. As if  
she can invoke him. Stupid, stupid Mulder. He doesn’t realize what he’s  
got. What I’ve got in his name. What I’d kill to have over and over  
again, every night.

I lose myself in that splendid, brittle body and finally, after a while,  
I come back to myself, naked and held by the last woman on earth I  
should touch, and the best lover I’ve had in years.

“Dana,” I say, shaking her. “When’s Mulder coming back from his  
convention?”

She looks at me, drowsy. “Someday. What’s today?”

“Sunday?”

“Fuck,” she replies. “Today. This morning. God. I’ve got to stop this.”

She’s up and moving, throwing on her clothes. She’s a mess, and I notice  
something. Blood. She’s bleeding.

“You’re bleeding,” I tell her, lazily pulling on underwear and jeans. I  
can get out of here fast enough. She’s jerking on her bra and shirt,  
smoothing her hair and looking exceptionally guilty.

“Bleeding?” she asks. “God dammit!”

She flounces off to the bathroom, furious. I remember what she said about  
cancer. I think about the corpse. She will be a very attractive corpse.

“Is that the cancer?” I ask, jeans painstakingly buttoned.

“Yeah,” she says, returning with a white handkerchief held to her nose.  
“Thanks.”

“I gotta get out of here. Mulder catches me, I’m a dead man,” I say.  
“Good luck.”

Her eyes go distant. “Yeah. You too,” she murmurs. I go to the door,  
and just for a moment I wait. She looks good. Too good to be dying. But  
she is.

So in the end, I am watching her from the door and wondering why. Then  
I don’t wonder. There isn’t any why.

 


End file.
